Blinding, Deafening, Quickening
by LynxWhitetailTheGreat
Summary: Centers around the main cast. Each chapter a different viewpoint; eventually the plot will go somewhere but to be honest I'm not exactly sure where that is yet. Popular ships will occur.
1. Monmouth and Ruminations on Life

**Chapter One:** Monmouth and Ruminations on Life

(set after Blue Lily but before Raven King; I haven't gotten #4 yet so...)

Blue Sargent was covered in dust. Her hair, her clothes—even her skin was colored a dusky, shadowy brown. She let out a puff of air and watched as a  
cloud of dust slowly dissipated in the still air.

She was lying on her back in a huge, cavernous space lit only by whatever chinks of lights could sneak in around its boarded-up windows. Some of the higher windows were not covered, or perhaps their boards had fallen off, and by the door someone had cleared a single pane and left the wood in a pile on the floor. In blue's current position it was easy to see all these fragments of light, overlapping and criss-crossing one another, and imagine herself climbing up one of the elongated sunbeams like a regal, shimmering staircase. The whole building was really much like a grand old mansion, she thought, or like the ruin of one. Appropriate, then, that Gansey should have chosen to live here.

Slowly she sat up, a rainstorm of dust falling from her arms and body. The migrant dirt was nearly and inch thick on the rough wooden floor, and Blue had unwittingly immersed herself in it. She frowned as she brushed it from her shirt, which had been made for her by a dear friend and which in hindsight was perhaps not the best choice for today's adventuring. Blue was not the sort of girl who spent undue time worrying about clothes, but this dust was thick and stubborn and had already sifted into every stitch and pore. Matters were made even worse by the large number of sequins sewn in strange and possibly random patterns across her shirtfront—Persephone was not one for moderation when inspiration struck. Blue's efforts had made no noticeable difference; she frowned again and brushed more vigorously.

She of course had expected dust, and grime and uneven floors and broken windows. But really the intensity of the decay was what had tripped her up—quite literally, in fact; she'd wanted to examine the state of affairs in this room but it hadn't been her intention to coat herself in it. The whole place had such a feeling of abandonment that Blue felt it in her stomach like someone had punched her. Heart-wrenching, really. She wanted desperately to help the old building, to tear the boards from its windows and sweep every particle of dust from its floors, but at the same time there was an almost sacred feeling to the silent air and blue dared not disturb a thing. The dust was time personified, nature ever so slowly reclaiming what man had created.

Blue shook her head and began to get to her feet. The toe of her shoe suddenly caught the edge of a straying board and she nearly toppled back into the dusty lake, but she managed to right herself and planted her feet firmly on the warped planks of the floor. Her jeans, showing less denim now than furry brown, begged her attention. She gave her knees a good whack and got a face-full of dust, which caused her to sneeze and nearly fall over again. She grimaced at the state of her clothing but decided that perhaps it was a good time to cut her losses and leave. She felt a bit sheepish at the result of her adventure—she had, after all, been warned of the conditions on the building's first floor, and insisted on seeing it anyway.

She tossed a last glance over her shoulder at the scene of her mishap. A Blue-shaped hollow was imprinted into the dirt, bare floorboards peeking through the carpet of neglect. She considered returning in a few days just to see if her mark was still there. It felt strangely satisfying to leave some proof to mark her trail, some claim on this dear old building.

Without further consideration, Blue picked her way carefully toward the door she had entered through. The cavernous space with its dim corners reminded her of an actual cavern, the dust like an extremely shallow lake through which she waded. Her mind flashed the image over her vision, of rocky water and darkness and the weight of all the world above her.

She looked up and banished the memory. This wasn't a cave, and if there were shadows here it was because there was also light.

Blue's empty room was the bottom half of a long-abandoned factory outside Henrietta, Virginia. The letters on the gate marked it as Monmouth Manufacturing, but none of its current tenants—or, as far as Blue knew, anyone in Henrietta—had any idea what had once been manufactured there. Any equipment that might have provided a clue was long gone, the warped windows boarded, the massive iron gates locked. The building had sat for decades empty except for birds and looters, slowly knitting itself a coat of rust and dust, until a headstrong boy with money to spare and dreams of magic took a liking to it and bought the whole thing. Out of principle Blue was somewhat opposed to Gansey's whims, and she found the purchase of an entire factory 'just because' quite annoying indeed. But it was difficult to protest when she stood in the center of his room upstairs on the second floor, vaulted and open as a cathedral, with its wall made entirely of ancient windows and its floor strewn with the complicated workings of Gansey's wandering mind. Even here, among the gentle sunbeams and dust-filled air strong with the smell of abandonment, Blue felt a stirring of awe. It was truly a beautiful building, she thought, if a bit lonely.

Blue shoved open the heavy door, making a face at the squeal of its rusted hinges, and filled her lungs with fresh air. The dust was starting to go to her head. A cloud shifted to reveal the sun, and she blinked in the sudden brilliance. Putting up a hand to shade her eyes, Blue scanned the factory's parking lot. A black BMW, long and mean; a hulking, shiny Suburban; and a violently orange '73 Camaro populated the worn patch of dirt. Blue's own vehicle, a tottering bicycle, was propped against the wrought-iron gate. She stepped gingerly away into the sun and applied her weight to the old door, which creaked and complained and finally shut. She climbed the stairs, glad that she hadn't needed to ask Gansey for help. He meant well, but letting him help her felt so much like giving up.


	2. Detatchment

**Chapter 2:** Detatchment

It was a gray day already when Helen called. Gansey had woken up cold, and the skies seemed to have decided to allow him their pity. The clouds had extended their fingers to shroud Monmouth completely in gray, and the overhead lights weren't working properly, so Gansey's morning had been very dim and laced with a damp chill that couldn't be banished with coffee or sweaters. Helen wasn't happy, either; mostly because she had been forced to take public transportation instead of her usual private helicopter but if good part because Helen was rarely happy. Natural selection had forced out any natural happiness and replaced it with snappiness.

Gansey had planned to spend the day wrapped in a blanket at his desk, deciphering ancient Welsh texts, so the idea of a foray into the clouds to fetch his impatient sister was not particularly appealing. But Helen hated to be kept waiting, and as she sounded snappish now he didn't want to give her an excuse to blame him for something. So he sighed and promised to hurry and stumbled around looking for suitable clothing and shoved on a sweatshirt over his navy blue school sweater just as an extra precaution against the ugly damp and shouted his plans to Ronan, who was probably still sleeping anyway, and squeezed reluctantly into the all-encompassing fog with a satisfying slam of the door. He decided to take the Suburban, since first impressions were everything and he knew how little love Helen had for his beloved Camaro.

Every action today seemed angrier than usual, he mused as he slammed the car door as well and narrowly missed slicing off a few toes. The sleek, expensive SUV shimmered immediately to life and bore him swiftly toward the airport and his sister's pinched expression, but Gansey felt himself missing the Pig's familiar, edge-of-a-breakdown growl. Missing it angrily, of course. Was this how it felt to be Ronan, always irritated by everything? Or was it simply that Gansey was unused to a bad mood? He decided that his emotions and sense of self were overly tied to the weather. Gray days really got him down.

Of course, this sudden call from Helen wasn't helping either. The traffic was bad even on this terrible day, and Gansey thought it would be best to call his sister and reassure her that he was indeed on his way. One perk of a car made in this century was int built-in phone, although Gansey was practiced in the art of driving while on a cell phone. It was practically a requirement for Aglionby.

Helen picked up on the fourth ring, as if she hadn't been waiting for his call and was somehow otherwise occupied.

"Are you close? I'm not going to stand outside and wave you down, you know."

"The traffic's horrendous. I'll be another, oh, half an hour, maybe." Gansey tried to sound casual, but he could hear a hint of his bad mood slipping through the mask. Helen heard it, too.

"Don't get mad at me. I would have been more than happy to fly myself. Unfortunately, Mom seemed to think that her campaign trip was vastly more important than my needs." Mrs. Gansey was currently running for the Virginia state senate, a crusade that was taking up far more of her son's time than he had anticipated. More that he wanted to deal with, really, especially today. He frowned and swerved sharply to avoid a reckless teenager in a pickup truck. Helen had begun a rant on the campaign that Gansey suspected was more to do with her current situation than animosity toward their mother. Eventually he simply disconnected her. He hadn't called to talk politics.


End file.
